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Thoughts From Printing Experts

How to Promote Your Band with Stickers

People love bands. People love stickers. And people love to proudly display stickers of their favorite bands.

In this first installment of our new blog series on music marketing, we offer some tips on how your band can use stickers to build an audience:

1. Make sure the stickers are legible and include your URL. This might sound like overly simple advice, but people need to know your name and how to find you online. Keep it simple. Bright colors and logos are great, but acronyms are useless until people already know who you are, and chances are, if you're reading this article, you aren't there yet.

2. Don't waste the back side. Use the back side of the paper the sticker comes on to advertise upcoming shows, promote your social sites, or plug your new album. It could also serve as a business card, giving the recipient everything he or she needs to know how to get in touch with you. You can also make it a postcard, allowing you to mail stickers to anyone and everyone.

3. Stick them on all your stuff. Stick stickers on your instruments, cases, and vehicles. You can't ask others to promote your band if you aren't doing it yourself.

4. Stick them everywhere else. Telephone polls, foyers and/or front doors of businesses, newspaper boxes, street signs, the bathroom at the club you're playing, etc. Get permission first and/or ask for forgiveness later. Don't be annoying, but do whatever it takes. This is rock and roll.

5. Give them away. Sure, stickers cost money. And sure, it'd be great to get a buck or two or five for each one. Giving them away, however, can be more profitable in the long run.

• Give some to your friends, family, and fans and ask them to plaster them all over town.

• Place some stacks at local record stores, venues, bookstores, restaurants, coffee shops, etc.

• Are you a solo musician with a tip jar? Place a stack of free stickers next to it.

• Throw them out to the crowd during your shows.

• Got a merch table? Give one to everybody who buys something, signs up for your mailing list, asks for your autograph, wants to pose for a picture with you, etc. (You get the idea.)

• Slide one into each the case/sleeve of every CD or DVD sold out of your truck, at your merch table, or on your online store. (All online customers should get free stickers, too, regardless of what they ordered.)

• When you tip a server, barista, or bartender, give them a sticker, too. People are always asking them for stuff to do around town. Maybe they'll send some new fans your way.

• Do you have friends in other bands? Hand them out to the crowds at their shows, and invite them to hand out stickers at your shows.

6. Stick it out. Keep up the hard work. The bigger the effort you put in, the bigger crowds you'll get in return.